2025 MLB Thread

[Cobra Mgr]

How are you going to be a pitcher on the 2025 Rockies and have a problem after giving up a HR in Coors? If any one in the history of baseball should be able to not take it personal it should be a Colorado pitcher.

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Cobra Mgr

How are you going to be a pitcher on the 2025 Rockies and have a problem after giving up a HR in Coors? If any one in the history of baseball should be able to not take it personal it should be a Colorado pitcher.

I was interested to see how long Devers took to get going. The video in your post doesn't show that but in this article, look at the second video. Devers does linger a bit, but nothing overly drawn out. Freeland looks bad in this situation.

Heh, they made Devers complete his home run trot after things had been settled down and teams were back in their dugouts (third video). Had to make it official, you know?

[Westheim]

That was the Rockies' 100th loss of the year, and it was barely September. Maybe that has something to do with it. Wasting the best years of your life on rekinding that tire fire every fifth day and such...

[Cobra Mgr]

Astros.......dissension in the ranks?

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Cobra Mgr

Astros.......dissension in the ranks?

I don't know your opinion of Jomboy but he does find some interesting stuff and interprets it well. Because, yes, it is obvious from the looks on the faces that this was intentional. Which makes Framber Valdez an ignoramus and this story a candidate for my dumbness thread.

Catcher César Salazar was doing his job which at the time called for, in his judgement, Valdez to back off and reset. Valdez ignored him and had the misfortune of giving up a grand slam with the pitch. He's having a hissy fit, so he intentionally crosses up (i.e., throws a different pitch than what was planned) the catcher.

Valdez lies when he denies doing so. Just look at his face when he turns his back on the catcher. What a baby. Many of these ballplayers are just outsized children.

[Cobra Mgr]

Thoughts?

MLB games lasting 3+ hours:

2003: 28%
2004: 31%
2005: 30%
2006: 32%
2007: 39%
2008: 37%
2009: 38%
2010: 38%
2011: 40%
2012: 47%
2013: 52%
2014: 58%
2015: 46%
2016: 54%
2017: 62%
2018: 54%
2019: 62%
2020: 59%
2021: 67%
2022: 60%
2023: 17% ��
2024: 12% ��
2025: 15% ��

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Cobra Mgr

Thoughts?

Thought: Of all the changes to MLB in recent years, the pitch clock is the most successful. It did not change the game at all, other than rid of it of the obvious and totally unnecessary time bloat.

[Westheim]

The pitch clock in conjunction with keeping the antsy batter in the box is the one change that has been good for the game.

[Amazin69]

The rules were always there (Charlie Finley had a pitch clock in Kansas City before I could dress myself), it's just that the umpires didn't enforce them. What I hate is using this as a thin wedge to butcher the game in unimaginable ways. (No pickoffs! No shifts! No extra innings! Barf.)

[Hrycaj]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

The rules were always there (Charlie Finley had a pitch clock in Kansas City before I could dress myself), it's just that the umpires didn't enforce them. What I hate is using this as a thin wedge to butcher the game in unimaginable ways. (No pickoffs! No shifts! No extra innings! Barf.)

Your comments about the clock are right on. I love it and it has always been on the books but rarely enforced. As to the other changes they do not bother me as much as I thought they would. I will readily admit to hating the idea of banning the shift but it really hasn’t bothered me in reality. I would also argue that it isn’t banned, it just has guardrails now. You still see the shortstop for instance start on the legal side of the game per pitch but still in a position to gobble up anything up the middle on the lefty batter. It did however, allow for more opportunities to find a hole or gap pull side for a lefty.

I’m still not a fan of the pickoff, extra innings and the bigger bases. The rationale around the bigger bases is very flawed in my mind. I can’t wait for the ABS system. That thing cannot get here soon enough.

[Westheim]

Today's Cubs day game is on Crapple TV, and I want to punch a hole straight through my wall.

(If you don't know, Crapple TV games are not available live on MLB TV, which makes them the only blackout of games that mean something for overseas subscribers, and I would rather disembowel myself than to give but a dime to that ******* company)

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Today's Cubs day game is on Crapple TV, and I want to punch a hole straight through my wall.

(If you don't know, Crapple TV games are not available live on MLB TV, which makes them the only blackout of games that mean something for overseas subscribers, and I would rather disembowel myself than to give but a dime to that ******* company)

That's the spirit. Find something else to watch. Any minor league games available through your apparatus?

[Westheim]

Doesn't look like there's a minor league day game either.

Oh well, powergaming it is, then...!

[Déjà Bru]

Here is a smile for you, perhaps. From The Athletic:

Yankees announcers biggest fear? Turning Cam Schlittler’s name into an expletive on air

By Brendan Kuty



HOUSTON — For YES Network broadcaster Ryan Ruocco, it was going to be another quick recap, a way to get viewers up to speed as the New York Yankees and the Chicago White Sox dragged into the bottom of the 11th inning Saturday. With one out and the Yankees ahead, 5-2, Ruocco gathered his thoughts. Then Schlit happened.

“This game, started by Cam S— … sh, sh … Schlittler,” he said.

He let out a light, knowing laugh, and continued.

“Bound to happen one time.”

The foul-mouthed flub — which lasted mere seconds in a game that ran three hours and 13 minutes — was what Yankees announcers told The Athletic was the inevitable outcome after weeks of worry among them.

They figured that one day, one of them would simply try to pronounce the name of the most impressive Yankees rookie pitcher in years, only to instead utter a curse word in front of baseball’s largest audience — and for a clip of the embarrassing moment to be recycled endlessly on social media.

“It’s a name fraught with peril,” YES’ lead play-by-play announcer Michael Kay said.

“Had to happen eventually,” said Dave Sims, Yankees play-by-player for WFAN.

As of Wednesday evening, a post from the “Talkin’ Yanks” podcast of Ruocco’s mistake on X had racked up 155,600 views.

For Schlittler, it was nothing new. The 24-year-old righty, who has put up a sparkling 2.61 ERA and a 2-2 record in nine starts since debuting July 9, has been dealing with people mispronouncing his name all his life. He said most people miss one of the L’s in his last name, which is German, leading to “Schitler” or “Schlitter.”

He said he hadn’t heard the clip of Ruocco stumbling over it, but he didn’t mind the miscue. Growing up in Walpole, Mass., most people got it wrong the first time, and his friends don’t even try anymore. To those close to him, and to most in the Yankees’ clubhouse, he’s simply “Schlit.”

To pitching coach Matt Blake, he’s Cam or “Schlit Dawg.” Reliever David Bednar had difficulty pronouncing his last name, too, first saying “Schitler” when asked how he would pronounce it earlier this week.

“It’s just a tough last name,” Schlittler said.

Despite Schlittler’s graciousness, Yankees broadcasters know he has a chance to be around for a long time, with his 100 mph fastball and unflinching confidence on the mound. They know they have to get it right, every time.

They all have their own techniques. Kay said he’s “really careful.” He likes to pause before saying Schlittler, but prefers to “stay away from it as much as I can.” He has used Schlittler’s full name upon first reference, and then he’s gone with a smattering of “Cam” and “the big right-hander,” which he admitted feels a little too cliche at times.

“I figure the more times you say Schlittler,” Kay said, “the better chance you have of messing it up.”

Ruocco agreed. He said that when he does NBA games, he prefers to use Giannis instead of Antetokounmpo when referring to the Milwaukee Bucks star to guard against stumbling over it or breaking up “the flow of the way you’re calling a play.”

Growing up in Philadelphia in the 1960s, Sims recalls watching ads for Schlitz Beer, and he uses it as a cue when pronouncing Schlittler.

“You just take the extra effort to move your tongue over your teeth and — boom! — there it is,” he said.

It also helps to move quickly past any mistakes, Sims said.

“(Longtime NFL broadcaster) Don Criqui once told me, ‘Hey, it’s already out to Pluto, nothing you can do about it. Move on,'” Sims said.

YES Network Yankees clubhouse reporter Meredith Marakovits said she just tries not to get “too much in your head” before saying Schlittler. But she also walked over to Schlittler on his first day with the team and apologized in advance.

“I’m really sorry,” Marakovits told him, “I know I’m going to say your name wrong at some point in time.”

Marakovits remembered Schlittler looking back at her and smiling.

“You wouldn’t be the first one,” he said.

For WFAN analyst Suzyn Waldman, it’s about concentration. She said she hasn’t struggled with his name yet, and that she only mispronounces names “if I don’t know who they are.”

“Watch,” she said, “I’ll probably do it today.”

Ruocco had prepared extensively to say Schlittler. He said that the “Schl” part of his name “isn’t an easy, roll-off-the-tongue one.”

“With the letters around it, if it doesn’t roll off your tongue, you land in s—, quite literally,” he said. “It’s definitely a name that I’ve had to be more conscious of than any other that I can remember during my time calling Yankees games.”

All of the announcers said they have battled with pronouncing various names over the years. But none of them came with the added risk of accidentally cursing at an audience with a sizable number of teens and children, Kay said. The Federal Communications Commission threatens penalties for on-air profanity, but it determines “how (its) rules apply” to specific instances depending on the nature of the content, the time of day it aired and context, according to its website.

Ruocco does like the idea of taking risks, though, pointing to a call that referenced the name of the “Fudd Around And Find Out” podcast by UConn women’s basketball star Azzi Fudd.

On the night of his Schlittler stumble, he had actually punctuated the end of the sixth inning with, “Quality Schlit from Cam!”

It wasn’t off the cuff. Ruocco had been thinking about ways to make a pun using Schlittler’s name, wanting it to capture the moment without being over the top. He thought about it for a while and considered using “Filthy Schlit” or “Nasty Schilt” if Schlittler finished the frame with a strikeout. But since Chicago’s Will Robertson flew out to end it, Ruocco changed it up.

Was the pun perhaps still on Ruocco’s mind when he botched Schlittler’s name later in the broadcast? Maybe, he said.

He recalled a time, years ago, when Jimmy Rollins tied Mike Schmidt’s Philadelphia Phillies franchise hits record, and he accidentally said “Mike S—” instead of Schmidt on the air because he had accidentally been saying it that way while rehearsing in his office earlier in the night.

More than a decade later, he stepped in it again.

To Ruocco — and the rest of the Yankees announcers — it’s about getting past the “Schl” in Schlittler, and then they’re home free.

“And if you screw up, guess what it’s going to be?” Ruocco said. “It’s going to be s—.”

[low]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Today's Cubs day game is on Crapple TV, and I want to punch a hole straight through my wall.

(If you don't know, Crapple TV games are not available live on MLB TV, which makes them the only blackout of games that mean something for overseas subscribers, and I would rather disembowel myself than to give but a dime to that ******* company)

Same with the Brewers game tonight. I swear they've been on Apple TV+ ten times this year. I hate it.

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by low

Same with the Brewers game tonight. I swear they've been on Apple TV+ ten times this year. I hate it.

The Mets had an entire weekend series yanked by different channels (Crapple, FOX, ESPN, in that order) ... TWICE this year. Against the Dodgers in May, and Phillies in June. First, your team is playing miserably, and then you have to suffer that relentless parade of imbeciles...!

If there was anything to MLB HQ they'd make FOX & F(r)iends take turns, but I guess Rob Numbfred is too busy getting bundles of hundos shoveled into his big dumb mouth by his spineless lackeys to care.

[Westheim]

New drinking game: every time the Marlins' play-by-play says "Philadolphia", you have to take a shot.

I've been under the table since the second inning.

[mytreds]

**redundant post sorry**

[Amazin69]

The jerk who scooted across an entire section of the park in Miami to grab Harrison Bader's HR ball from the feet of the middle-aged woman who was bending over to pick it up and then scurried back to deliver it to his son, smirking in his triumph, can seriously go **** himself. Right along with all the people who were OUTRAGED when the woman went over and called him on his dick behavior and demanded (and eventually) got the ball back.

"OMG, he was doing it for his kid!" Big f'n deal. It's not as if the son had gotten the ball on his own. If Dad wants to get the kid a HR ball so bad, he can buy one on eBay.

(You can get the ball Johnny Ray hit for a dinger off of Jeff Innis on June 14, 1987 for $129. [Mets won the game anyhow, 7-3. Suck it, Johnny.])

And now all these mob-mentality psychos are calling the woman a "Karen" (I thought we weren't supposed to use racial insults?) and doxing her (apparently she's a school administrator in NJ) and trying to get her fired and all the tiresome crap that makes modern America such fun.

Call me a sexist, but if a woman is trying to pick up a ball that went to her, not you, now is not the time to do your "scoop-and-score" routine. I don't care if you spawned; stick your "parent privilege" up your butt. Grrr.

ETA: Jesse Barfield off of Todd Stottlemyre, September 17, 1990, for $125. (Also did not help, as the Jays won, 6-4. That's what the Yanks get for starting the not-exactly-immortal Steve Adkins.)

[Cobra Mgr]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

The jerk who scooted across an entire section of the park in Miami to grab Harrison Bader's HR ball from the feet of the middle-aged woman who was bending over to pick it up and then scurried back to deliver it to his son, smirking in his triumph, can seriously go **** himself. Right along with all the people who were OUTRAGED when the woman went over and called him on his dick behavior and demanded (and eventually) got the ball back.

"OMG, he was doing it for his kid!" Big f'n deal. It's not as if the son had gotten the ball on his own. If Dad wants to get the kid a HR ball so bad, he can buy one on eBay.

(You can get the ball Johnny Ray hit for a dinger off of Jeff Innis on June 14, 1987 for $129. [Mets won the game anyhow, 7-3. Suck it, Johnny.])

And now all these mob-mentality psychos are calling the woman a "Karen" (I thought we weren't supposed to use racial insults?) and doxing her (apparently she's a school administrator in NJ) and trying to get her fired and all the tiresome crap that makes modern America such fun.

Call me a sexist, but if a woman is trying to pick up a ball that went to her, not you, now is not the time to do your "scoop-and-score" routine. I don't care if you spawned; stick your "parent privilege" up your butt. Grrr.

Was that your wife?